Today's Headlines - 28 July 2023
The Biodiversity Act approved for amendment
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

Lok Sabha gave its approval to a Bill to amend some provisions of the Biological Diversity Act of 2002. The Biological Diversity (Amendment) Bill seeks to address concerns of several central ministries, state governments, researchers, industry, and other stakeholders, regarding the implementation of the 20-year-old law that is meant to preserve the country’s biological diversity and to ensure its sustainable use.

What is the biodiversity law, and why does India need one?

Biological diversity refers to all kinds of life forms — animals, plants and microorganisms — their gene pools, and the ecosystems that they inhabit.
The 2002 Act was a response to the global need to protect and conserve biological resources, which are under threat due to human activities.
The extent of the damage was highlighted, much later, in a landmark 2019 report by the Intergovernmental Science Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), a scientific body similar to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
That report issued a stark warning: about 1 million animal and plant species, out of a total of about 8 million, were facing the threat of extinction.
About 75 per cent of the Earth’s land surface and 66 per cent of the oceans had been “significantly altered”, it said.
But efforts to protect biological diversity had begun much earlier. In 1994, countries including India had agreed to a Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), an international framework agreement similar to the more famous one on climate change.
There was a general agreement on three things: (i) that indiscriminate use of biological resources needed to be halted, (ii) that sustainable use of these resources, for their medicinal properties for example, needed to be regulated, and (iii) that people and communities helping in protecting and maintaining these resources needed to be rewarded for their efforts.
India’s Biological Diversity Act of 2002 was enacted by the government of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee with these objectives in mind.
It set up a National Biodiversity Authority as a regulatory body, and prescribed the conditions in, and purposes for, which biological resources could be utilised. The purposes are mainly related to scientific research and commercial use.
What amendments have been proposed in the biodiversity law?

The Bill passed makes several amendments to the 2002 Act, addressing most of the concerns raised by the practitioners of traditional systems of medicine, the seed sector, and the pharmaceutical industry.
Certain categories of users of biological resources, like practitioners of Indian systems of medicine, have been exempted from making payments towards the access and benefit-sharing mechanism.
Companies registered in India and controlled by Indians are now treated as Indian companies, even if they have foreign equity or partnership, thereby reducing the restrictions on them.
Provisions have been included to speed up the approval process in cases of use of biological resources in scientific research, or for filing of patent applications. The penalty provisions for wrongdoing by user agencies have been rationalised.

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Today's Headlines - 31 July 2023
International Tiger Day
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

29 July is celebrated world over as the International Tiger Day in a bid to raise awareness on various issues surrounding tiger conservation. It was first instituted in 2010 at the Tiger Summit in St Petersburg, Russia when the 13 tiger range countries came together to create Tx2, the global goal to double the number of wild tigers by the year 2022. Last year, the designated date for achieving the goals of Tx2, however, saw uneven progress. As per the World Wildlife Fund, while countries in Southeast Asia struggled to control population decline, others, like India, fared much better.

How Project Tiger came about

Project Tiger was launched by the Central government on 1 April 1973, in a bid to promote conservation of the tiger.
The programme came at a time when India’s tiger population was rapidly dwindling. According to reports, while there were 40,000 tigers in the country at the time of the Independence (in 1947), they were soon reduced to below 2,000 by 1970 due to widespread hunting and habitat destrcutions.
Concerns around the issue intensified when in 1970, the International Union for Conservation of Nature declared the tiger as an endangered species.
Two years later, the Indian government conducted its own tiger census and found that there were only 1,800 of them left in the country.
To tackle the problem of hunting and poaching of not just tigers but also other animals and birds, then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi promulgated the Wildlife Protection Act in 1972.
A year later, after a task force urged the government to create a chain of reserves dedicated to tiger preservation, Indira unveiled Project Tiger.

What is Project Tiger?

Launched at the Jim Corbett National Park, the programme was initially started in nine tiger reserves of different States such as Assam, Bihar, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, covering over 14,000 sq km.
Notably, Project Tiger didn’t just focus on the conservation of the big cats. It also ensured the preservation of their natural habitat as tigers are at the top of the food chain.

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Today's Headlines - 01 August 2023
Key takeaways of WMO report
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

According to a new report, released by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), Asia is the world’s most disaster-prone region and it experienced 81 weather, climate and water-related disasters in 2022. These events directly affected more than 50 million people with about 5,000 getting killed and economic damage worth $ 36 billion, the report added. Although, in 2021, the continent had been affected by around 100 natural disasters, the extent of these hazards was more prominent in 2022 — the number of people and facilities affected, and economic damage has increased.

What are the key takeaways from the report?

According to the report, while the mean temperature over Asia in 2022 was about 0.72 degree Celsius above the 1991–2020 average, it was about 1.68 degree Celsius above the 1961–1990 average.
This rise in temperatures has had some severe fallouts, including an uptick in the occurrence of extreme weather events.
For instance, droughts ravaged numerous parts of Asia in 2022. China particularly suffered the most as last year, the Yangtze River Basin, located in the country’s southwest, experienced the worst drought in the last six decades.
This not only affected crops and vegetation, as well as the drinking water supply but also caused an economic loss of about $ 7.6 billion.
Many other regions were hit by severe floods and extreme monsoon rainfalls. Pakistan is the most notable example – it received 60 percent of normal total monsoon rainfall within just three weeks of the start of the 2022 monsoon season, and the heavy rains resulted in urban and flash floods, landslides, and glacial lake outburst floods across the country.
More than 33 million people were affected, over 1,730 people died and almost eight million people were displaced, according to the report.
Apart from natural disasters, climate change has exacerbated glaciers melting in Asia due to high temperatures and dry conditions.
Four glaciers in the High Mountain Asia region, centred on the Tibetan Plateau, have recorded significant mass losses, with an accelerating trend since the mid-1990s.
At the same time, these four glaciers show an overall weaker cumulative mass loss than the average for the global reference glaciers during the period 1980–2022.
Even thesea surface temperatures in Asia are getting warmer than ever before. The report pointed out that in the north-western Arabian Sea, the Philippine Sea and the seas east of Japan, the warming rates have exceeded 0.5 degree Celsius per decade since the 1980s. It is about three times faster than the global average surface ocean warming rate.

India in report

In India, heavy rainfalls “lasting from May to September triggered multiple landslides and river overflows and floods, resulting in casualties and damage”.
In total, this flooding resulted in over 2,000 deaths and affected 1.3 million people — the disaster event caused the highest number of casualties of any disaster event in 2022 in India.
The report also said economic loss due to disasters relating to floods exceeded the average for the 2002–2021 period. Pakistan incurred a loss of over $ 15 billion, followed by China, over $ 5 billion, and India, over $ 4.2 billion.
Another extreme weather event that became a mainstay in Asia last year was heat waves.
The report noted that India and Pakistan experienced “abnormally warm conditions” in the pre-monsoon season (March–May), the report mentioned. China, Hong Kong and Japan also saw the mercury rising to record high levels in 2022.

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Today's Headlines - 05 August 2023
Mineral iron is important in ocean ecosystems
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

According to new research published in Nature, mineral forms of iron play an important role in regulating the cycling of this bio-essential nutrient in the ocean. The discoveries pave the way for future research into the relationship between the iron and carbon cycles, as well as how changing ocean oxygen levels may interact.

More about the research

The research, led by the University of Liverpool and involving collaborators from the United States, Australia, and France, aims to fill a knowledge gap in ocean science.
The early Earth's ocean was low in oxygen and high in iron, which served as a catalyst in many biological reactions. These include photosynthesis, which oxygenated the earth's system through its proliferation.
Because iron is less soluble in well-oxygenated seawater, precipitation and sinking of iron oxides resulted in a decrease in iron levels.
As a result, iron now plays a critical role in regulating ocean productivity and thus ecosystems throughout the modern ocean.
It is thought that organic molecules called ligands, which bind iron, regulate iron levels above their soluble thresholds.
This viewpoint has underpinned the representation of the marine iron cycle in global models used to investigate how future climate changes will affect levels of biological productivity.
However, oceanographers have been perplexed as to why there appeared to be a much larger loss of iron due to insolubility in the ocean than would be expected based on the measured high levels of ligands.
In general, ocean models built in accordance with the expected pattern have performed poorly in reproducing observations.

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What does the study show?

The new analysis focuses on the environmental dissemination of ARGs. With every 1% rise in PM2.5 pollution, antibiotic resistance increased between 0.5-1.9% depending on the pathogen — a link which has only intensified with time.
The researchers added that this airborne spread may have also caused premature deaths in India and China, among other countries in South Asia, North Africa and the Middle East which are population dense.
An average of 18.2 million years of life was lost in 2018 worldwide, resulting in an annual economic loss of $395 billion (more than Pakistan’s GDP) due to premature deaths.
The paper is unique in its scale and scope: global antibiotic resistance is driven by multiple factors, one being the “effect derived from the environment, which is poorly understood in relation to antibiotic resistance”.
The researchers collected data from 116 countries spanning almost two decades, to observe the link between rising PM2.5 and antibiotic resistance. The researchers also analysed other predictors, including sanitation services, antibiotic use, population, education, climate.
How is air linked to antibiotic resistance?

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria and genes travel through different pathways: food, soil, water, air, and even direct contact with sources such as animals.
The hypothesis is that ARGs, when emitted from, say, hospitals or livestock farming, could latch on to pollutant particles, which were found to contain “diverse antibiotic-resistant bacteria and antibiotic-resistance genes, which are transferred between environments and directly inhaled by humans, causing respiratory-tract injury and infection.”
When suspended in the environment or breathed into the lungs, the ARGs could enter the bacteria found in the human body and solidify its resistance to drugs. “PM 2.5 can facilitate the horizontal gene transfer of antibiotic-resistant genes between bacteria,” the research found.
PM2.5 contains a high concentration of antibiotic resistance-determinant genes, and these particles can travel far and wide due to wind speed, water evaporation, and dust transport.
ARGs are also more abundant in urban air particles than in sediment, soil or rivers, the analysis showed.

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Today's Headlines - 16 August 2023
Wildfires ravage Hawaii’s Maui Island
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

The images of the aftermath of the devastating fire in Hawaii’s Maui Island have grabbed the world’s attention. The wildfires, which have already killed nearly 100 people and left thousands homeless, have become part of a wider global list of unusually intense blazes that have raged across Europe, Canada and the United States.

What happened in Hawaii

Hawaii is no stranger to fires, which burn on a smaller scale with some regularity, especially in the drier parts of the island.
The current fires – active in Lahaina, Upcountry and Pūlehu/Kīhei – are believed to have started with the one in Lahaina spreading quickly across the town.
The exact cause of the fires is still under investigation, but experts agree that the fires were bolstered by strong winds from Category-4 Hurricane Dora, which was passing through the Pacific Ocean – far to the southwest of the island.
Low humidity and dry vegetation too precipitated the issue. Initial reports suggest that the changing land-use patterns in Hawaii, which has seen farm and forest lands being replaced by flammable non-native species of grasses like Guinea grass, are a likely cause for the easy spread of the fire.
Over the past few decades, wildfire has been increasing in Hawaii as a result of changing climate, as a result of increases in invasive species, and a lot of our active agriculture going out… and becoming fallow.

What is the link between wildfires and climate change?

Wildfires have been a part of life on Earth, usually following a seasonal pattern during the June-August period.
Be it natural or human-made, the phenomenon is a critical part of the ecosystem. A healthy fire is key to ensuring that forests remain robust and resilient.
It also aids the natural replenishment of nutrients in the soil, helps sunlight reach the forest floors, and encourages the germination of seeds.
It is the increasingly intense nature of the wildfires – aided by the warming weather, dry conditions and change in rain cycles – that is now becoming a source of worry.
Experts have compared it akin to the difference between throwing a lighted matchstick on a pile of wet, green wood and on dry kindling. And increasingly, climate change is determining the degree of dryness of the latter.
Besides the destruction of lives and livelihoods, these catastrophic wildfires also release an immense amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
There is also one immediate issue – these immense fires contribute adversely to air pollution, leading to long-term and short-term respiratory issues, heart disease and lung cancer.

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Today's Headlines - 18 August 2023
Net zero carbon emission country
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

Bhutan has emerged as a country with net zero emissions and not only curbed its carbon footprints, but has also transformed into a carbon sink, absorbing more carbon dioxide (CO2) than releasing, It reported that the recent report from the World Economic Forum revealed that the eight countries including Bhutan have attained an impressive feat of net zero emissions.

More about the News

Bhutan is one among the 196 nations that committed to the Paris Agreement during the UN Climate Change Conference focused on restricting global temperature increases to 1.5 degree Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Apart from Bhutan, Comoros, nestled in the Indian Ocean and Gabon in Central Africa have managed to control the carbon emissions and set an example for other countries.
Comoros, by conscientiously managing its agricultural, fishing, and livestock sectors, complemented by rigorous environmental safeguards has maintained low emissions.
Bhutan's unique success as the first nation to achieve net zero emissions is rooted in its population of 8,00,000 and its remarkable forest coverage of 70%.
Why this achievement

The nation prioritizes sustainable organic farming and forestry practices, accentuated by the reliance on hydropower and the prudent management of its main economic driver, tourism.
Notably, Bhutan charges a $200 sustainable development fee per day from tourists, underscoring the value placed on eco-tourism and environmental protection.
It has been reported that another reason behind this control of emissions is the forests being an intrinsic part of its spiritual heritage.
Guided by a climate-conscious forest economy, Bhutan mitigates greenhouse gas emissions, preserves wildlife habitats, mitigates forest fires, and practices sustainable forest management for timber, fruit, and rubber - fostering a circular economy.
The nation has embarked on pilot projects that explore sustainable timber construction, showcasing innovative solutions.
Bhutan's journey to net zero emissions, fueled by an unyielding commitment to its environment and cultural heritage, is a source of inspiration for the world.
As nations navigate the complexities of climate change, Bhutan's story beckons us to embrace sustainable practices and safeguard our precious planet.

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Today's Headlines - 22 August 2023
Extreme heat mean for the Mediterranean Sea
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

Frequent heat waves cause huge damage to underwater ecosystems and researchers expect more of them in the future.

What are the solutions to heat stress?

Extreme heat has plagued the Mediterranean for weeks. Wildfires raged across at least nine countries in the region from Algeria to Greece.
But the soaring temperatures are not only a danger for people and ecosystems on land; they’re also harming marine life.
Without a doubt global climate change is the main reason for the heat waves in the sea. It’s causing the ocean to warm.
Why are high sea temperatures a problem?

In a warming world, marine creatures are in danger of suffocating. Gases like oxygen and carbon dioxide dissolve better at colder temperatures, so that means the warmer the water; the less oxygen is available to breathe.
Conversely, higher temperatures also cause an increase in metabolism, which in turn means animals have to breathe even more than usual). That combination also heightens the risk of death by starvation for marine life.
The rise in temperature accelerates metabolism, and the organisms need more food to maintain this metabolic rate.
Algal blooms are more common in hotter waters too. Such blooms can further deplete oxygen levels and produce toxins harmful for fish, marine mammals and birds, for instance.
What species and ecosystems are worst hit by marine heat waves?

High water temperatures are most harmful for animals living at the bottom of oceans, lakes or rivers.
These benthic species include corals, mussels, sponges, starfish and plants like sea grasses, and are often attached to rock or solid ground. They can’t migrate when it gets too hot.
Scientists observed mass deaths of benthic species along thousands of kilometers of Mediterranean coastline between 2015 and 2019.
Many benthic species are crucial to the marine ecosystem. They filter the water and keep seas, rivers and lakes clean by eating dead organisms.
Some species are an important food source for other creatures or are harvested by humans. Benthics like soft corals, seaweed and seagrasses provide some of the main ocean habitats.
Heat is particularly harmful for Posidonia oceanica or Neptune grass. And the large, slow-growing seagrass is found only in the Mediterranean. Previous heat waves have decimated the species, which is bad news for the climate.
What does extreme heat in the Mediterranean mean for people?

Warming seas are already affecting fishing activities in the area. Fishermen are catching fewer familiar species and instead are finding more invasive fish which they have difficulty selling.
Rabbitfish and lionfish are edible, but other invasive fish aren’t. Some are even poisonous, like the puffer fish.
Habitat loss could also lead to an overall decline in fish populations, while disappearing seagrass means coasts will be more exposed to future storms.
This could also have a knock-on effect for tourism because divers will be less likely to visit an impoverished underwater landscape.

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Today's Headlines - 23 August 2023
The vegetated canopies for creating green spaces
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

As Europe battles scorching temperatures this summer and wildfires blaze across the continent from the Mediterranean to Spain, the role of climate change in making heatwaves hotter and more frequent has come into focus. At a broader level, greenhouse gas emissions from human activities have heated the planet by about 1.2 degrees Celsius since pre-industrial times. These grim predictions have brought attention to a range of mitigation measures. One such initiative to bring greenery back to urban spaces in Spain involves installing vegetated awnings or canopies.

What are vegetated canopies?

Introduced in Santa Maria Street in Valladolid, Spain, the awnings are tensioned sail-like structures that have been anchored to the facades of surrounding buildings. They mimic natural canopies found in forests and various plant species.
The lightness and ease of installation of the ‘Greenshades’ allow for shade and the presence of greenery in commercial streets and public spaces, where trees or other vegetation are often absent.
Here is how they work:

The sails with anchors and supports are prepared by laying down the specific geotextile substrate or material. An irrigation system is installed at the highest side, from where the water falls by gravity, soaking the entire substrate.
In addition to water, fertilizer keeps the vegetation in perfect condition. The excess water is collected at the lowest point and into a connected drainage system.
The seed mixture is then projected onto the geotextile. After four months, the shade is expected to be completely covered with vegetation.
The awnings can be placed in streets, where planting trees may not be feasible owing to the lack of space. The plants grow hydroponically, with a water supply point and water outlet for draining purposes.
What are their advantages?

The plants chosen for these awnings belong to species that are optimised for the absorption of gases such as carbon monoxide and nitrogen oxide.
The substrate also absorbs sound waves, reducing noise pollution. A square metre of a vegetated canopy generates the oxygen required by a person for the whole year, apart from filtering harmful gases, according to the company.
The hanging planter also allows for the centralisation of water and light installations.
This is meant to induce savings as the lights are equipped with movement sensors that illuminate the street according to its need.
The adoption of such canopies could eventually contribute to urban biodiversity, creating a healthier ecosystem that supports a variety of wildlife.

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Today's Headlines - 26 August 2023
Fukushima nuclear water release
GS Paper - 3 (Nuclear Energy)

Twelve years after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown, Japan is releasing the power plant’s cooling water into the ocean. Japanese officials say it’s safe, but experts are divided. It’s hard to have a purely fact-based discussion about Japan’s Fukushima water release plan. Due to several scandals and a lack of transparency, trust appears to be low in both TEPCO, the company that operated the now-defunct Fukushima-Daiichi nuclear power plant, and the Japanese government, with its close ties to the atomic energy industry.

Fukushima: Why is the water being released into the Pacific Ocean?

Storage tanks holding the cooling water at the ruined facility are full. Japan has had to cool the reactors at the nuclear power plant since they were destroyed during a catastrophic tsunami in 2011.
It takes 170 tons of cooling water per day to keep them cool. In addition, rain and groundwater have been seeping into the site. There are 1,046 storage tanks holding 1,343 million cubic meters of water.
Once the water has been filtered, it is considered safe and sent through a one-kilometer (0.62 mile)-long tunnel before being released into the Pacific Ocean — a process that will take an estimated 30 years to complete. The radioactive waste, meanwhile, will remain on land.
Is Japan allowed to release filtered cooling water into the sea?

Both Japan’s atomic agency and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have approved the plan.
The IAEA said Japan had met international safety standards and that “discharges of the treated water would have a negligible radiological impact to people and the environment.
They said it had been common practice for nuclear power plants worldwide to release used cooling water into the ocean for decades routinely.
However, environmental and fishing experts, as well as neighboring states, have accused Japan of downplaying the level of radiation in the cooling water.
They are concerned about far-reaching ocean contamination, potential environmental damage, a fall in fishing revenue and loss of reputation.
How will the water be prepared before it’s released?

Before it’s released into the ocean, the contaminated cooling water and groundwater will be sent through a filter system called the Advanced Liquid Processing System (ALPS).
ALPS can filter 62 different radionuclides — radioactive elements — but can’t filter out the radioactive isotope tritium.
So, TEPCO wants to dilute the water until the concentration of tritium is reduced to about 1,500 Becquerel per liter or less than a fortieth of the national safety standard. A becquerel (Bq) is a unit that measures the rate at which radioactive material emits radiation or how many atoms in the material decay in a given time.
TEPCO says that if the levels of tritium remain too high after filtration, they will repeat the process before releasing the water.
How dangerous is tritium?

Tritium is a form of hydrogen that occurs naturally in Earth’s atmosphere. It is radioactive but far less dangerous than cesium-137 or strontium-90 — both of which are life-threatening.
It emits a weak beta particle that can be stopped by a sheet of plastic or human skin.
It’s a different story if strontium-90 gets into the human body: “Strontium is absorbed by the bones, and once it’s in the crystalline structure of the bones, you can’t get rid of it again.

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Today's Headlines - 29 August 2023
Water shortages reduce from wastewater
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

Europe has experienced severe heat and drought over the last few summers, and 2023 has been no different. Vast swathes of Central and Southern Europe are simply too dry from a lack of rainfall. Human-induced climate change has led to more heat waves and drought and is one reason for Europe’s growing water crisis. At the same time, demand for the resource is growing, with industry and agriculture extracting more water from the ground, rivers and lakes than can be replenished.

Who uses the most water?

Industry uses half of Europe’s water resources, while a further 40% is hoovered up by agriculture and 10% by households.
In the European Union, water scarcity impacts 11% of all citizens. Falling water supplies can lead to households facing use restrictions. But the problem also impacts the energy sector.
In 2022, French authorities had to switch off some nuclear power plants because river water used for cooling them was too warm.
Last year, the dry summer also reduced hydropower in Norway. Farmers, though, who use large amounts of water for crop irrigation, are also hard hit by water shortages and drought.
Could using industry wastewater help farmers?

One solution for agriculture could be to use more treated industrial and domestic wastewater for irrigation and protect valuable freshwater supplies. Six times more waste water could be reused across the EU than current levels.
Freshwater resources are scarce and increasingly under pressure. In times of unprecedented temperature peaks, we need to stop wasting water and use this resource more efficiently.
New EU regulations on minimum requirements for water reuse for agricultural irrigation came into force this summer.
The regulations stipulate that EU member states must process communal and industrial wastewater so it can be used by farmers.
Processing and reusing water could replace a fifth of irrigation that currently uses groundwater in Spain and Portugal, said the European Commission.
In France, Italy and Greece, it could be as much as 45%. Wastewater could cover all irrigation needs in EU countries with smaller agricultural sectors.
Leaky pipes lead to massive water waste

One way to save water that is often overlooked is maintaining the pipes that shuttle the resource to homes and businesses.
On average, a quarter of the EU’s freshwater is lost during transport to taps because of leaks and broken pipes.
Currently, countries most affected by drought and a lack of rain — such as Spain, Italy and Bulgaria — invest the least amount of money per citizen to fix leaky water infrastructure.

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Today's Headlines - 07 September 2023
IPBES report on Biodiversity loss
GS Paper - 3 (Environment)

In the most extensive study on invasive species carried out till date, the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) in its new publication – the “Assessment Report on Invasive Alien Species and their Control’’ – has found that there are 37,000 alien species, including plants and animals, that have been introduced by many human activities to regions and biomes around the world, including more than 3,500 invasive alien species and that invasive alien species have played a key role in 60% of global plant and animal extinctions recorded.

Highlight of the report

The report, which was released on 4 September 2023, said that invasive alien species are one of the five major direct drivers of biodiversity loss globally, alongside land and sea use change, direct exploitation of organisms, climate change, and pollution.
The report has noted that the number of alien species (species introduced to new regions through human activities) has been rising continuously for centuries in all regions, but are now increasing at unprecedented rates, with increased human travel, trade and the expansion of the global economy.
Not all alien species establish and spread with negative impacts on biodiversity, local ecosystems and species, but a significant proportion do – then becoming known as invasive alien species.
About 6% of alien plants; 22% of alien invertebrates; 14% of alien vertebrates; and 11% of alien microbes are known to be invasive, posing major risks to nature and to people, the IPBES has said.
The report further noted that many invasive alien species have been intentionally introduced for their perceived benefits, “without consideration or knowledge of their negative impacts’’ – in forestry, agriculture, horticulture, aquaculture, or as pets.
Nearly 80% of the documented impacts of invasive species on nature’s contribution to people are negative.
The water hyacinth is the world’s most widespread invasive alien species on land. Lantana, a flowering shrub, and the black rat are the second and third most widespread globally. The brown rat and the house mouse are also widespread invasive alien species.
The report said that the annual costs of invasive alien species have at least quadrupled every decade since 1970, as global trade and human travel increased. In 2019, the global economic cost of invasive alien species exceeded $423 billion annually.
These trends are projected to accelerate as the global economy expands, land and seas are used more intensively, and demographic change takes place, the report said.
Invasive alien specieslike Aedes albopictus and Aedes aegyptii spread diseases such as malaria, Zika and West Nile Fever, while others also have an impact on livelihood such as the water hyacinth in Lake Victoria in East Africa led to the depletion of tilapia, impacting local fisheries.
The IPBES report has further warned thatwarming temperatures and climate change could favour the “expansion of invasive species’’.
Flashback

The IPBES released its report following a week- long plenary from 28th August, with representatives of the 143 member States which have approved the report.
IPBES is an independent intergovernmental body established to strengthen the science-policy interface for biodiversity and ecosystem services, working in a similar way to the IPCC, which is the UN’s climate science body.
The study, which has taken place over a period of four years, has been by 86 leading experts from 49 countries, drawing on more than 13,000 references.

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Today's Headlines - 09 September 2023
Indore ranks first in Clean Air Survey 2023
GS Paper - 2 (Infrastructure)

Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Bhupender Yadav awarded first rank to the Information Technology hub of Madhya Pradesh, Indore, in the Swachh Vayu Sarvekshan-2023 (or Clean Air Survey), conducted by the Central Pollution Control Board.

More about the Sarvekshan-2023

Under the first category (million-plus population), Indore ranked first, followed by Agra and Thane. Amravati secured first rank in the second category (3-10 lakh population), followed by Moradabad and Guntur.
Similarly, for the third category (less than 3 lakh population), Parwanoo secured the first rank, followed by Kala Amb and Angul.
The fourth International Day of Clean Air for Blue Skies (Swachh Vayu Diwas 2023) aims to create stronger partnerships, increase investment, and share responsibility for overcoming air pollution, with the global theme of "Together for Clean Air."
About NCAP

The Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) has been implementing the National Clean Air Programme (NCAP) as a national-level strategy, outlining the actions for reducing the levels of air pollution at city and regional scales in India since 2019.
The NCAP aims to systematically address air pollution by engaging all stakeholders and ensuring necessary action.
A total of 131 cities have been identified for the implementation of the city-specific action plans under this programme, for reducing air pollution by up to 40 per cent by FY26.
NCAP focuses on the preparation and implementation of national-level action plans, state-level action plans, and city-level action plans for the targeted 131 cities.
Flashback

The NCAP Ministry has also launched "PRANA", a portal for monitoring the implementation of NCAP.
In this portal, action plans of cities, states, and line ministries will be reflected and monitored for their implementation status.
In addition, best practices adopted by cities are shared on the PRANA portal for adoption by other cities.

#upsc #news #headline #indore #ranks #cleanair #survey #infrastructure #UNIONMINISTER #Enviroment #Forest #climate #bhupenderyadav #technology #pollution #controlboard #madhyapradesh #sarvekshan #agra #thane #amravati #moradabad #guntur #parwanoo #angul #NCAP #forest #air #city #PRANA #Portal